


A Rose, A Pilgrim, and Fortune's Fool

by TriffidsandCuckoos



Series: Then I Defy You Stars [1]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Disfigurement, M/M, Multi, Past Child Abuse, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-29 04:53:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16257053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TriffidsandCuckoos/pseuds/TriffidsandCuckoos
Summary: Hard to find your soulmate when your mother has burned away the name on your wrist.





	A Rose, A Pilgrim, and Fortune's Fool

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes you just want to reference the world's best known love story in your fic about poly wizards.

Credence's left wrist has been scarred for as long as he can remember: a giant distorted burn, over an inch long, tearing from the base of his palm downwards. Ma did it with a poker from the fire, and it aches with every change in the seasons. Maybe it’s a good thing the church is always so cold, enough to linger in his bones even when the heat comes, so he never needs to so much as roll up his sleeves. He hates to look at it, even think about it. It’s an eternal reminder that he is ugly and alone, and neither of these things will ever change. Not without knowing the name.

Ma only tells him that she had done it to scald his soul clean. Credence isn’t sure how that could be possible, but he accepts it because his Ma knows everything about souls: what mars them, saves them, dooms them. She doesn’t dismiss the soulnames like some priests or preachers; instead, she teaches that the Lord granted humans the gift of companionship but the Devil had twisted that blessing the way he did all the others, so that you can never be sure whether yours is a true name or one of the Devil's tricks, to tempt you towards the one best suited to damn you forever. It definitely sounds like something the Devil would do, Credence thinks. The Devil always seems to think up the clever schemes, while God believes in suffering.

(He bites his other wrist automatically, knowing that while Ma sleeps he has to punish himself.)

Chastity whispers the story to him once, before Modesty arrives; whispers that Ma had known it was a false name, because it was a _man's_. Credence stares at her in horror, mind filled with the sin of it all, how he should thank their Ma for saving him from temptation, except then his lips move and he hears his voice ask, "What was it?"

Chastity's mouth presses into a tight line, and instantly Credence retreats, babbling, apologising, frantic. Then Ma comes back and the moment is over, both of them quick to snap to attention even though Chastity doesn’t have to. She’s just a good girl, exactly why Ma likes her better and knows Credence for a sinner. 

It takes another year and Credence shivering with forbidden illness, beaten for sloth after he doesn’t want to get out of bed, for Chastity to pull him into one of their secret hugs and whisper in his ear, "Percival."

He blinks, thinking it’s more of the illness burning the sanity out of him. "What?"

"Ma told me to stay in my room the whole time. That was all I could hear. I'm sorry."

It's wishful thinking, the first time Credence meets Mr Graves. Obviously it can’t be real, not a man like that, and anyway Credence isn’t supposed to want men, that was all just the Devil's trick. But then Mr Graves says his name so _softly_ , brushing at a hair on Credence's jacket and then letting his fingers linger just for a moment at the line of skin above his collar, and for the first time Credence truly knows Want – not just hunger, or desperation, but a greedy fire inside him, burning him up even in his dreams. After all of Ma's efforts, he sins so easily. But he just wants to be whole.

He should have known it wasn't real. After Mr Graves hits him, drags him along, Credence starts to stutter and with a contemptuous expression Mr Graves pulls back his sleeve to show quite clearly the name _Albus Dumbledore_.

Not Credence. Not even close.

It’s good, after that, to vanish into the darkness that has been pulling at his thoughts every night – the hole he thought Mr Graves might fill. No point in staying whole when there is no reason for it, nobody to care, nobody who sees Credence as a person. When Mr Scamander's voice reaches him, he thinks _maybe_ – except then Mr Graves takes that too. When the wizards try to kill him, he doesn’t even fight back.

Except he doesn’t die. He doesn’t know what he is, barely a thought, but as he slowly drifts through the city, pieces of him scattered and found, his mind returns, and an odd image grows into a memory: Mr Graves' face melting into another. They called him another name.

Without meaning to, he finds himself in the house where Mr Graves had only ever taken him once. Following himself, he drifts down, further down, one staircase and then _through_ to another.

The man inside the locked room is broken, bleeding, barely alive. Credence knows the feeling. He's Mr Graves, or at least he looks like him, washed out like ink after a storm. There's a manacle around his left wrist which Credence doesn't want to look at, turning his gaze aside every time he tries. Suddenly sick of it all, he reaches out and with a moaning wrenching sound the thing stretches and then falls apart.

He sees the name _Theseus Scamander_ and laughs at himself. Then the man stirs and Credence knows he has to help him anyway.

When Credence says his own name, the man – still Percival – stares at him, before scoffing and turning away. "Illusion," he says, voice harsh and dried out. "Thought so."

Credence frowns. "I'm real," he says, although he adds, "I think I am," because really anything could be happening now.

Percival looks at him, surprisingly sardonic given his current state, and then hold out his hand. Credence blinks at it. "Wrist," Percival orders. At least, Credence hears it as an order, although he suspects that the terseness might have more to do with the way Percival guzzled the water so quickly, before Credence warned him about the sickness that always brings you.

"I don't – Credence starts, but when Percival's gaze intensifies he wordlessly holds it out. He barely stifles a gasp at the brush of Percival's fingers on the back of his wrist as he turns it over, hand limp in that grasp, yet isn't sure whether he wishes they'd passed over that numb blankness instead.

Percival hisses, more like a cat than a human. "Who did this?"

"My ma." He flinches a little at the fierceness in Percival's expression when he looks up at him. "She... She said the Devil was trying to tempt me." For a moment he thinks Percival might explode too, out of the house in a vengeful cloud. His ma's dead, but Credence doesn't know whether he should say so yet. "My sister told me a name. That's all I know."

Percival looks like he's about to ask, when he frowns and seems to reconsider, eyes flicking in thought from Credence to his wrist (still held so lightly), to the room, to his own arm seemingly forgotten at his side. Credence waits. He's good at waiting.

"One name?"

Credence blinks. Whatever he'd been expecting, it wasn't that. "Just the first name?" He flinches, because Ma hates – hated – it when he speaks in questions like that. Percival doesn't seem bothered though, or at least he doesn't so much as move to hit him. It occurs to Credence how easily this man could hurt him – a tightening of the grip, a sharp snap to the side, Ma's done it before – and yet he feels so strangely relaxed under that touch. If Percival moves any higher, he thinks, he might swoon. It's a thousand times more intense than anything he felt from Mr Graves. He swallows. "Percival. She said Percival." And there it is, his secret out between them.

Percival frowns, but he doesn't seem angry. Credence can already tell the difference, how the slightest change shows an entirely different mood. He could watch for hours. "Yes," Percival says slowly, looking at the burn, so livid against Credence's pale skin, "I suppose she did."

"I know it's not you," Credence assures him, even as his heart aches. Of course he still wants a soulmate, but he might never find him, and really, why would he want him anyway? 

Percival's eyes narrow, seeming to search Credence's face for something. "How do you know that?" he asks, not unreasonably.

"I saw yours." It's a hideous breach of privacy, obviously. Credence expects Percival to pull back, and he's confused when he doesn't. Instead the man continues to look at him, frown deepening as he looks even more confused than before. "When I took that...thing off. It said Theseus Scamander." It feels odd to say the name out loud. At first Credence just thinks it's the strangeness of it – nothing like a real name, something incredible and fantastical – yet somehow it seems like there's more to it. There's a taste to the name that lingers, the same way the moment he read it he couldn't forget it. 

Percival nods slowly. "It does," he says, although his voice doesn't have the warmth Credence would expect at the reminder. Then he carefully raises Credence's wrist and asks, with a raised eyebrow, "That looks rather unnecessary."

Credence swallows. He supposes a witch (not a wizard, he thinks, if he can't believe anything Mr Graves told him) wouldn't understand. "She had to burn the wickedness out of me."

Percival sucks in a breath and his grip tightens, not enough to hurt but enough for Credence to flinch in anticipation. As fast as it happens, the pressure leaves once more, Percival dropping his hand and Credence's wrist following as if neither one of them truly wants to let go. "I'm sorry," Percival tells him, and Credence thinks he means it even if he doesn't have to. "It's..." He clears his throat and looks at him. "I meant it looks rather large for one name."

Credence's mouth twists, not wanting to think the man ridiculous but at the same time – "That just the size that it is."

"But if she wanted to hide just one name," Percival goes on, taking hold of Credence's wrist again and bringing it to eye level, as if Credence doesn't have the sight of it burnt just as strongly into his mind, "why would she make it that large? They don't bother with those ridiculous lists of middle names, so there wouldn't be any need for it to be wider than half an inch at most."

Credence bites his lip, breaths coming faster and heavier than they should as he pictures how it must have happened, the white hot poker swinging down to sear his flesh. Distantly he wonders at Percival's talk of middle names. Credence doesn't know anyone with more than two names, save for the fine men who can shape the world he sees in the papers. He never so much as thought about it.

"Shit," he hears, and he can't even bring himself to feel shock at the word. "Sorry, I'm not – Theseus is much better at this sort of thing, I'm sorry."

"It's fine," Credence says, still staring at the burn and so faintly he's not sure whether Percival could hear him. "I'm sorry he's not here."

Percival is silent for a moment, before he says firmly, "He will be. I'd like to see them try to stop him."

Credence smiles. "He sounds nice."

"I'm not sure whether 'nice' is the word for it," Percival muses, and Credence's smile widens ever so slightly to hear that warmth he expected finally filling it, "but he's good, if that's what you mean."

Nodding, Credence finally tries to lower his wrist, and Percival gives way easily. "I'm sorry I'm not him."

"You're hardly a disappointment," Percival says, and there's a fervency to it which makes Credence's eyes widen. He opens his mouth but no sound emerges, and he thinks he must look very stupid, but he can't stop himself. Percival starts to frown again, then his eyebrows suddenly raise and he says, "Of course."

"Of course what?"

"Did you understand what I was telling you? About what...that woman did?" Percival's voice turns strange for 'that woman', as if the words are strangling him.

Credence shrugs before he can stop himself – a habit he'd fought so hard to lose only for Modesty to reteach it to him. "She was trying to burn out one of the Devil's tricks," he says, then swallows and adds softly, "Maybe she should have made it bigger." Because Credence sinned anyway, allowed himself to be misled, and he couldn't even pretend it was God's plan. He drops his gaze, looking mindlessly at the burn which defines him more than anything else. He fancies he can see shadows curling out from under it, and he supposes those have their place too.

When he does finally look up again, Percival is staring at him, the lines and wounds in his face suddenly so much more obvious. He looks like he wants to talk, except his mouth never manages to form words. He reaches out, then hesitates, and as much as Credence wants to push forward he knows he shouldn't.

Eventually Percival just shakes his head, jaw firming, and then holds out his own arm between them and begins to roll back the tattered sleeve of his shirt. Credence opens his mouth to remind him that he already saw the name, that he's sorry, except the words die before they ever leave him.

Percival uncovers _Theseus Scamander_ and then...

Then he keeps going.

With widening eyes, Credence sees another name emerge, scrawled underneath Theseus'. It's not possible. It can't be possible. But he can see it all the same.

It's his.

 _Theseus Scamander_ and _Credence Barebone_ , taking up a space on Percival's wrist just over an inch in length. Credence raises his arm, holds it parallel, and the burn matches perfectly.

Chest tight with the wonder of it, he looks up and meets Percival's gaze, and feels not just warmth but strength too filling him at the expression in those eyes.

"Two names?"

"Two names," Percival tells him. "And believe me, he's wanted to meet you for a long time."


End file.
